‘Cabe Has To Defend Being A Humanitarian’: Robert Patrick Gears Up For New ‘Scorpion’

The fourth season of Scorpion is underway, and the first two episodes have been a whirlwind of action. Star Robert Patrick spoke with CBS Local about why his character Cabe Gallo helped the escape of his nemesis Mark Collins (Joshua Leonard) and how he will have to navigate on tonight’s episode now that he is gunless and badge-less.

We’re two episodes into the fourth season of Scorpion. What can audiences expect from this season as a whole?

Robert Patrick: You’re going to find out a lot more about Cabe Gallo, that’s for sure. Cabe Gallo has been arrested, the team has bailed him out. They’ve mortgaged the business. They’ve got to now take whatever jobs they can, and they do so without the protection of Cabe Gallo or the federal government. Cabe has been relegated to basically being a non-paid intern for Scorpion. It’s a bit humiliating for him. It sets up a different sort of situation for him on all the missions and what they do while he’s gunless and badge-less. He starts therapy with Eddie Kaye Thomas who plays Toby Curtis. We start to find some deep dark secrets that Cabe has, some traumatic events that have happened to him. In a scene we shot the other day, Cabe comes to the realization of just how important Scorpion is to him and that they’re his family. It’s deep, it’s very profound and touching stuff.

On the show, there’s a lot of unique problem-solving, but it also dives deep into relationship issues. Is it difficult to find a balance between action and interpersonal drama on the show?

RP: For the writers, I think that’s the fun part, that challenge of how to do that. We have six or seven characters that they have to write for. We bring in new characters, we set up different conflicts, different sort of challenges for each of us. So I think they have a lot of fun doing it. We do have a parameter that we have to stick to. We have to make money. We have to solve missions. And relationships have to be dealt with as they happen. It must be fun for the writers to try to figure all that out.

The first two episodes of this season were a wild ride. What’s going on in Cabe’s mind going into episode three after inadvertently helping the escape of Mark Collins.

RP: The great thing about Cabe — the thing I certainly enjoy about him — is that his character is an ideal, righteous dude. He stands up for what he believes in. He seems to have so much virute. I think in his mind, freeing Collins was the humanitarian thing to do because he didn’t want the guy to sit there and get electrocuted. When he takes it off, he has to trust him. Of course, Collins turns out to be a guy that you can’t trust. Lo and behold, now Cabe is going to have to defend his position of being a humanitarian. He didn’t think it was right to torture somebody. I think we’ll explore those themes and it’ll swing Cabe’s way. Sylvester (Ari Stidham) will also become Cabe’s lawyer. You’re going to see us pursue trying to find a lawyer and what a disaster that is. And eventually you’ll see Sylvester become a lawyer pretty quick.

We’re very excited to watch it Robert. We look forward to seeing episode three tonight.